Drifters: Stories from the Dark Side of Delinquency

By Jack Hobson and Ed.D.

The world has changed. Teenagers exist in a different world than you grew up in. Video games, gun violence, sexting, and bullying have all exploded onto the scene, leaving many parents shut off from their children and vice versa. In that vacuum, too many kids gravitate toward darker temptations, but there is hope. You are not alone.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Black Opal Books
• Release date: Nov 16, 2013
• ISBN: 9781626940802

Book preview

The world has changed...

Teenagers exist in a different world than you grew up in. Video games, gun violence, sexting, and bullying have all exploded onto the scene, leaving many parents shut off from their children and vice versa. In that vacuum, too many kids gravitate toward darker temptations, but there is hope.

You are not alone.

Come behind the scenes and walk the halls with school resource officer Jack Hobson, Ed.D. Firsthand, he witnessed the scenarios that caused good students to turn bad or troubled teens to clean up their act. Sometimes, the difference could be a few simple words from the right person to stop the dangerous drift toward delinquency or worse.

Some students drifted back. Others did not. These are their stories.

KUDOS FOR DRIFTERS

In Drifters: Stories from the Dark Side of Delinquency, Dr. Jack Hobson gives us an intriguing look at high schools today and what really constitutes school security. I was impressed with the way Hobson handled the problems the students presented and the way he interacted with the kids. They had nothing like this when I was in high school, but with all that has been happening in schools lately, I am glad to see they are taking security seriously. The book has tons of good information in it for those of us who have to deal with teens on a regular basis and spend most of our time scratching our heads over the things they do. Drifters is timely, thought-provoking, and informative. It is also very entertaining. -- Taylor Jones, reviewer

Drifters: Stories from the Dark Side of Delinquency by Jack Hobson, Ed.D. is a fascinating read. The book is overflowing with useful information on dealing with teenagers, as well as giving us a glimpse into what these kids go through during their high school years. It's written in first person and is a combination of case studies and the personal experiences of the author who worked for 30 years as a police officer and school resource officer. Hobson uses the stories of these kids as examples of how to handle problem kids. I found myself caught up in their stories, rooting for kids I've never met. I thought Drifters was insightful, well-written, and a pleasure to read. -- Regan Murphy, reviewer

A sometimes funny, sometimes heartbreaking book that reads like a novel. Dr. Hobson illuminates what really goes on within our schools today. Even better, he offers hope. -- Bonnie Hearn Hill, best-selling author

DRIFTERS:

Stories from the Dark Side of Delinquency

Jack Hobson, Ed.D.

A BLACK OPAL BOOKS PUBLICATION

Copyright 2013 Jack Hobson, Ed.D.

Cover Art by Christopher Allan Poe

Copyright 2013 All Rights Reserved

eBOOK ISBN: 978-1-626940-80-2

DEDICATION

For Nancy, Mo grai, Mo saoil

FOREWORD

By

Carolyn Petrosino, Ph.D., Professor, Criminal Justice, Bridgewater State University, Bridgewater, Massachusetts, June 2013, co-author of American Corrections -- The Brief, Cengage

I fell in love with the field of criminal justice shortly after discovering it. Today I am enjoying a career that now spans more than 30 years. I've had a variety of powerful experiences, including working with at-risk kids in a community setting and assisting the efforts of incarcerated offenders who made attempts at rehabilitation. I also worked as a Hearing Officer for the New Jersey State Parole Board for more than 10 years. For the past 20 years, I've been in academia, teaching a variety of courses.

It is this background that allows me to fully appreciate the work of Jack Hobson and his book, Drifters. You see, our paths are similar. His experience as a practitioner also superseded his own voyage into academia. Jack first worked as a police officer coming face to face with those who had entered the world of crime; he then became a School Resource Officer (SRO), engaging with students on the cusp of delinquency and criminality.

I came to know Jack after he moved into academia, while I was Criminal Justice Department Chairperson at Bridgewater State University. Appreciating his experience in law enforcement and his reflective insights as an instructor, I did a very smart thing and recruited him to become a Visiting Professor for our department. He has been an invaluable colleague and instructor ever since.

Jack is the complete package in my view. He possesses both street and book knowledge. He knows how to make the best use of both. He is also a caring and compassionate person about many things, and his life's work has been about helping young people, improving the criminal justice system, enforcing ethical principles in police work, establishing fairness, and emphasizing the respect and dignity of others.

Due to his professional experiences and unique perspective, readers of Drifters can be assured that this book is written by someone who understands the integrated world of public schools, troubled youth, the reach of the juvenile justice system, and the potential of the School Resource Officer.

With increased concern about school violence, School Resource Officers (SRO) have become more commonplace in the public school system. Quelling violence in our schools is a high priority. With the mass shooting at the Sandy Hook Elementary School, in Newtown, Connecticut, fresh in our minds, we all wish to see the threat of violence in our schools reduced to zero. But more common than mass shootings, are young people walking precariously on the edge of delinquency, criminality and yes, violence. As a SRO, Jack Hobson saw his role as going beyond crisis management and providing security. It was also about delinquency and crime prevention. He took on the challenge of changing an ominous trajectory of some students before they are catapulted into the juvenile or adult criminal justice system. He took on the challenge of confronting drift.

This is a unique and important book. Not because it announces the next hopeful crime theory or program that promises to rid our society of the evils of juvenile delinquency. No. The contribution of this book is that it is revelatory. It makes explicit the ever-changing mindset of teenagers and it takes the concept of drift and animates it through the lives of the young people who came across Hobson's path as an SRO. Drift theory contends that juveniles who hold to conventional values, ideals and practices will periodically engage in delinquent behavior that runs counter to these values. They justify their law violating (or delinquent) behavior with specific arguments or neutralizations that allow them to suspend pro-social values and legitimize delinquent behavior. Hobson puts a face and personality on kids that drift as he describes his various encounters.

The subjects of Hobson's book are those kids living out a drift period in their lives. They were not raised in Leave it to Beaver households, but neither were their homes totally dysfunctional. Likewise, his subjects are not perfect kids, but neither do they have one-way tickets to state prison. They are, however, in states of drift.

As a SRO, Jack did more than merely go on auto pilot and apply the letter of the law to students for their missteps. His book describes his efforts to yank some of these students out of drift and into a place where they became more positive about themselves, and in which they began setting goals and meeting expectations (even if they were small ones).

This book will leave the reader with a true sense of hope. Today's youth are living in a far different world than previous generations. Their world goes at a much faster pace, risk taking is not viewed by them as risky at all, and younger and younger students are engaged with issues and problems that, many years ago, were dealt with only by adults.

Too often some youth feel increasingly isolated even in the age of Facebook, Twitter and other social media that makes public one's most intimate thoughts and experiences. Moreover, they are too often exposed to the use of violence as a means to settle conflict. The consequences of all these dynamics for this generation are far more impactful. Drift itself can have serious implications

What we need are more professionals who understand these dynamics and are able and willing to stand in the gap and intervene in this vortex. Hobson stood in that gap and hopefully many others will as well. He is the right individual to pen this book and share his insights.

Who should read this book?

* Academics interested in visual manifestations of drift described from the SRO's perspective;

* School Administrators who may be interested in the critique of school disciplinary policies from the SRO perspective;

* Parents with children involved in the public school system who are not aware of good kids and not so good kids engaging in drift;

* Law Enforcement Officers who serve as SROs;

* Teachers who are interested in gaining more insight into how students on the edge of drift think and how teachers might gain their attention; and

* Anyone who enjoys interesting books about real problems.

This book honors thinking out of the box and getting out of one's comfort zone. It is about not merely enforcing rules and policies, but investing in the lives of young people. If you are interested in alternatives to business as usual--you will be happy you read this book. Not much is written about School Resource Officers from their perspectives. Drifters is an eye-opening account about the world of the public school student--its innocence, turbulence and potential for both good and bad and the SRO as an agent of change. SROs are a critical resource to both students and school administrators. I am grateful that Jack wrote this book. Personally, I hope that there are many more Jack Hobsons out there--standing in the gap, saving--as much as possible--the future of our youth who find themselves in drift. -- Carolyn Petrosino, Ph.D.

PREFACE

A Glimpse Back Through My Rearview Mirror

Aristotle once said that to understand anything, you look at the beginning.

My grandfather once told me that if you find a job you love, make it a career and you'll never work a day in your life.

***

September 1976: My journey to find that special job took me to a university in Miami, Florida, where I learned about the effects of beer, sun, and beach sand on my naive eighteen-year-old psyche. It was my first time away from home. Nevertheless, in my spare time, I studied the Administration of Justice.

January 1979: I entered the Massachusetts Department of Corrections Officers' Training Academy. I graduated and, at twenty-one, five-foot-six and 125 pounds soaking wet, I found myself pacing within a maximum security cell block. It was a solitary job, except for my 24 friends who called Block 16B their home. I was called a hack, a hog, a pig, a screw, and a bull. They watched me, and I watched them plan and scheme. That's the way it was.

January 1985: I entered the Police Academy and took a job with a small town police department. I loved everything about law enforcement, and I knew that time spent with maximum security inmates gave me a unique perception of street patrol. But I had an affinity for education, so I became a DARE (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) Officer.

September 2007: I became an SRO (a school resource officer). I patrolled the high school hallways looking for Knuckleheads, my slang for kids who did stupid things, said stupid things, and cruised through high school by making stupid decisions. They represented that one percent of trouble-makers, my bad seeds sprouting toward delinquency.

July 2011: After more than three decades in criminal justice, I retired as a police officer. Long before bullying became a tragically iconic buzz word, and long before school shootings rocked the consciousness of the nation, I wanted to write a book about juvenile delinquency--a book about high school and those who inhabit it.

***

I hope you enjoy reading Drifters as much I enjoyed writing it. Fasten your seatbelts. -- Dr. Jack Hobson

INTRODUCTION

Jack

Girl fights, boy fights, sex in bathrooms, classroom rebellions, pranks, drugs, and alcohol. In three decades of working as a police officer and being an integral part of a school system south of Boston, I saw it all.

In 1999, the Columbine tragedy--something that nobody ever guessed would happen in this country--changed the way schools looked at security. That year, the necessity of a School Resource Officer became apparent. A school was now officially part of a cop's beat. It was part of mine. The same year as Columbine, I wrote my doctoral dissertation on bullying, long before that term became a buzzword.

So there I was, quite an anomaly, an experienced and unpretentious cop with a doctorate in education, working in a new cutting-edge high school. This book covers those years and those students. Most of all, it deals with those who drifted across the line toward juvenile delinquency, and with my efforts to push them back.

There's a myth among cops that they know everything, that working the streets and dealing with people in crisis, over time, gives them an edge, a second sense, something more than a hunch. I never bought into that myth, and I dismissed it altogether after my first day as an SRO.

On that day, a sunny September morning, school had been in session for twelve minutes when a girl was choked and knocked to the ground by her boyfriend. Fifty-nine minutes later, I arrested him. For the next almost seven years, the pace never slowed down. I made more arrests at the high school than I had the previous fifteen years on the street.

Whether I was patrolling a neighborhood, walking the halls of a school, or doing my professor stand-up at the university I was fascinated by the psychology of causation, what stages a person went through to become what they are now. To that end, I studied the many ideas considered within Drift Theory of Juvenile Delinquency. Drift Theory contends that impressionable kids drift this way and that, good and bad, until they've committed an offense, or until someone like me comes along to reel them in.

Delinquency prevention begins with two people: the kid who is drifting and the person who recognizes the drift. Two people--the kid and whoever he or she is going to have first contact with. For many in that new, four-story high school, I was that contact. I was the first roadblock on their arduous trek through adolescence, a bumpy and dangerous road littered with bad behavior.

At that school, on a daily basis, it quickly became apparent to me that a considerable amount of juvenile delinquency prevention is just listening. I would very often tell my wayward young friends that their problem was that they talked when they should be listening. I said the same thing to myself--just listen to the kids. My goal was to bring all of the theories I had learned into practice. I used one-on-one intervention--frequently under the radar--based on what I knew about juvenile makeup and on what I believed were the needs of each kid. Frequently, it worked out. Sometimes not. However, I believe we were all better for having had that contact. I was often successful because I learned how to make connections with kids who were drifting, and I tried to be there when they veered into the darkness of dangerous and unhealthy decisions. I dealt with each student as an individual and focused on their singular behavior or questionable decisions. The school viewed students through a broader telescope. I weighed my options within what I considered was in a student's best and future interests, according to my plan and all of its fifty-one shades of discretion.

Sometimes they liked me, sometimes they loathed me. But more ran toward me than away. I did everything I could to keep these kids out of trouble. I tried to think ahead for them.

Most would greet me respectfully, others--my works in progress--would acknowledge me as the cop, Jack, Fuzz, Mr. Jack, Five-O, Dude, or with the contemptuous question: Hey, Jack, do you smell bacon?

I would reply, Did you just call me a pig? Then I would explain that PIG stands for pride, integrity, and guts. Those were the words I needed them to hear.

If they'd committed a minor violation of school rules, I would often ease up a bit on the consequences. I respected and admired the school's administration, but I thought many of the rules were outdated and petty--somewhat trivial in the way discipline was handed out so quickly and by-the-book. I was no stranger to swift justice. I mention this only because prior to my SRO assignment for the school district, I worked in a different world, an alternate universe. I was a patrolman, a street cop, where reality ruled and consequences were often dire. Debates about guilt or innocence happened within the theater of the courthouse. This was the adult world.

But with budding delinquent behavior, consequences might affect future opportunities, including matters pertaining to trust and character, so if I could help it, I preferred to hold court in my office. My jury often consisted of guidance counselors or teachers and, at times, if the behavior was a serious breach of the schools code of behavior, a parent. I practiced restorative justice--the art of the deal--using compromise and leverage, but there was always a price to pay: punishment consistent with the particular school rule violation.

I didn't want a kid to check that box on a job application that started with, Have you ever been convicted? I didn't want one of them, on their first job interview, to be excluded because of a past indiscretion. Stealing hotdog or a cookie from the cafeteria was hardly worth the black mark of a larceny charge on a student's criminal history. I knew they'd be applying to college. I didn't want a stupid decision in high school to stop them from getting what they deserved in life.

The principal, vice principals, and faculty played by the rules, and they excelled at keeping all the plates spinning. I had some latitude, although I dropped a few plates. My juggling act was less complicated. I was always trying to think ahead for my drifting students. They were my chess pieces, and I studied them carefully. I didn't enjoy losing.

How easy would it have been to insulate myself behind the badge and project my ideas--and ideals exclusively from a law enforcement point of view--a view that considered arrest as the only option? How seamless and unforgiving would it have been to take the law into my own hands and pass off misbehaving kids to the juvenile court? Let the court figure out their personal and intricate malfunctions. But I knew that the court system doesn't work that way, and painting juveniles with that metaphorical big brush often paints over the problem. It leaves the surface clean, but the damage underneath survives. I understood that, and I loved a challenge.

Many police officers measure their job performance and success statistically: number of arrests, court appearances, calls for service. In this sense, their worth is judged procedurally. And it's linear. I just wanted to help struggling kids, one at a time. I wanted to recognize their behavior before their personal and unpredictable drift began. Measurements and statistical data do not work well in assessing the overactive and ever-changing teenage psyche. Statistics don't have a pulse. Children do, and their hearts beat with zeal and anticipation to different drummers. They are anything but linear, hence their drift.

If I saw kids doing something they shouldn't, I'd steer them into my office and deal with their behavior through mild persuasion, hoping they'd feel a little guilt or shame. I understood that if they were sent to the principal, vice principal, or adjustment counselor, they would be dealt with more harshly. For them, it could mean detention or suspension. More likely than not, parents would become involved. That could result in misunderstandings, each side calling foul. That's why I rarely added parents to the equation.

Teachers, principals, assistant principals, guidance counselors, and adjustment counselors are the life blood of any school. I never envied them their jobs. I had my own style in dealing with kids causing trouble. I was always big with handing out notes, nothing lengthy, just one word, such as Knucklehead. I'd give the student one of my small notices, and that would usually stop the trouble. I was no angel in high school, either and, in some strange way, I felt connected to those students, having been in their place thirty-five years before.

Columbine was always tucked back into the dark places in our minds. We were trained to know what to do in the event another school shooter struck or critical incident happened. It was called active shooter training. Take the fight to the suspect. Eliminate the threat with great prejudice. Fast, instinctual, and brutal, if necessary. I checked doors and made sure cameras were working. But prevention was still the best course of action. In concert with emergency services and first responders, we would conduct training exercises--hard lockdowns and soft lockdowns--out in the open, in plain view of students and staff. And we would coach them. We would help them practice their specific roles and responsibilities in the event of a critical incident within the school, like an active shooter. I earned the trust of students and teachers alike because we were bound to a common cause and that cause was our safety. This holistic approach to prevention training was a shared experience.

I always talked to everybody and listened to them. I would tell stories and stupid jokes. Earning the trust of my young rebels gave me instant membership in the confession club. Not the spiritual type. Instead, it was the Okay, Officer Hobson, I did it, but I can explain club. As a member of the club, I was entitled to hear all about their problems at home--too many problems, out of the mouths of babes, so to speak. But I listened viscerally and